A Dance of Dragons(A Fire In A Very Strange Place)
by Synchronized Harmony
Summary: Stoick woke up that morning expecting nothing to have changed. What he didn't expect was to find a a child tied up on his doorstep. Azula, young princess of the fire nation, didn't expect that either. Plot bunny about a Young Azula being transported to the HTTYD universe. Expect insanity, hilarity, and explosions to occur.
1. This is how It is(I don't Care)

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!" Hiccup Horrendous Haddock, future chief of Berk, screamed, racing through Berk's frigid forests as fast as his bony legs would carry him. "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH"

"WILL YOU STOP SCREAMING!?" Azula, previous princess of the fire nation and now his truly incredible and _oh so supportive _foster sibling, growled at him as she raced along beside.

"Aw c'mon, I've heard it's supposed to-hah-it's supposed to scare them!" came Hiccup's response. Without slowing down, he ventured a look behind him.

"Is it _working?" _

"Uuuhhh well it could be working, it's honestly"-he stopped to clamber over a pile of loose stones, before carrying on-"it's honestly hard to tell with all these trees in the way, and it's really pretty dark, and to be honest I didn't get a good look-"

"Okay, just shut up at let _me_ handle this," Azula turned on her heel and span to face the dark woods. From deep within, the sound of beating wings could be heard. They were faint, but getting louder. "I should never have run in the first place. A princess never runs!"

With that, she thrust her hand outwards with a violent snap. A blossom of orange flame flickered to life, illuminating the forest-for exactly one second. Then it was snuffed out by the frigid wind. Azula blinked in surprise.

"That was really good!" Hiccup's voice floated over(though she couldn't see him, he'd probably hidden himself somewhere.) She could _feel_ the sarcasm in his voice.

_Oh right. Firebending comes from the breath. How could I have forgotten-_

Then the trees parted, and _IT_ emerged. _IT_ was covered in hideous lumpy scales, reminiscent of ancient warts and bumps, with a gnarly brown coloration-save for it's garishly red _mouth, _rimmed with drool-lubricated fangs. Stumpy limbs hung limp at it's sides, but it didn't need them...this creature hung aloft in the air, suspended by the rapid beating of _it's_ twisted, malformed wings.

...I think that's all the description I need to give for one half-grown gronkle.

_Ash! It's huge!_

It lowered it's head, blinking it's bleary eyes.

_Ash! _Azula thought, _I'll need to blast this thing out of the sky before I become it's meal!_

She snapped into motion, gathering her chi into her hands and flinging it outward in a combustive ball of orange flame. Exactly as she'd been taught-not one hair out of place, she hoped.  
But perfect or not, the fireball splashed harmlessly against the dragon's scales with a pathetically audible _poof._ Far from dramatically and satisfyingly burning to death, the gronkle instead looked down at her with visible _fury._

_Dragons are fireproof, _Azula thought, a little regretfully. _Of course, what was I expecting? _

The dragon broke her out of her thoughts by suddenly letting loose a blast of yellow-white death, molten stone and fire fused together. Azula grit her teeth and punched outwards with her fist in response-surely she could just bend the dragon's fire away?

It could have worked, had she been fighting a Hideous Zippleback, or a Deadly Nadder, or perhaps even a Monstrous Nightmare. But this was a Gronkle, and she couldn't bend molten stone.  
So instead she was struck full in the chest by a sphere of lava, and perished tragically-a princess far from her home, too proud to run away and not skilled enough to survive. How truly unfair. Even more unfair was that _stupid_ chief's son would get to live, probably by getting far away while the beast picked it's teeth with her immaculately delicate bones-

Well.

Actually no, that would be a little difficult for him to do, considering he was suddenly beneath her, lying on the hard, cold dirt, coughing and sputtering.

Wait what?

The air smelled like sulphur, and _looked_ like smoke. The shadow of the dragon passed overhead.

"Shhh," Hiccup said weakly.

Azula blinked. Had he just...come back and pulled her out of the way?  
_Did that mean he'd seen what a fool she'd made of herself just now?_

She could feel her cheeks flush with embarrassment and shame, but she kept them in until the buzzing of the dragon's wings faded into the distance. Hiccup stayed perfectly still beside her. Hmm...this could be the longest she'd heard him be quiet since she'd first met him-when he wasn't asleep of course.

Finally he could take it no longer. "So."

"What."

"So, apparently the effectiveness of loud screaming as dragon repellent has been vastly overstated," Hiccup continued, shuffling to his feet. His shoulders waved around wildly while he talked. "Also ghmhmhmmmhmhmmhm."

The last bit was impossible to hear, because Hiccup broke off into a stream of mumbling. Azula huffed and got to her feet. She was a _mess._

"Stoick is going to kill you for this," she said, crossing her arms. "I could have gotten killed."

"Ahahahaha, but you didn't!" Hiccup started with a smile, but, seeing that she was serious, his smile faded. He cast his eyes downwards.  
"I'd actually prefer if you didn't...if you could just _not_ mention that dragon-slaying attempt number 48 ended up like this-or even existed, really, I mean, haha, what was I even talking about? Dragonslaying? Me?"

Azula pinched her lips. "You can't fool me, Hiccup. _I was here the whole time."_

Hiccup rubbed the back of his head. "Er...yes. So you were."

"Let's just get back."

With that, she began to stalk through the forest, in what she hoped was Berk's general direction. She still wasn't used to this place.

"I still think it's worth mentioning that you weren't supposed to be out here either, so..." Hiccup's voice floated up to her ears from behind her. "I think, if I were you, I'd let that influence your story a little bit."

Azula said nothing, opting instead to keep powering through the woods, letting his annoying whiny voice wash over her without sticking.

_Agni, he's so pathetic. Why is he the heir to this stupid place? I'd have thrown him out and picked someone better._

"And really, I think this went pretty well, all things considered. The-the pheremone, that worked great!" Hiccup continued, oblivious. He was referring to the skinful of old dragon urine he'd dragged along to try and attract a dragon. And yes. _That_ had worked. But other than that, "dragon-slaying attempt 48" had been a complete failure.

_And if that's pathetic, what does that make me?_ Azula looked behind her again. Hiccup had saved her life, of course. Had he realized that? He hadn't brought it up...even though it would be perfect blackmail material. Why?  
_I hate this place. Everything was better in the Fire_ _Nation_.

* * *

Stoick was having a bad day. First, he'd somehow lost his ceremonial cape. Then he'd learned that Gobber had lost his favourite axe. In a pond. Of molten steel. And now, great Thor above, _now_...now Stoick the Vast had lost his one and only son.

He wasn't sure exactly how it had happened. The boy was always underfoot-trying to wave around swords, or show him troll footprints, or just being a general nuisance-that when he disappeared, Stoick had taken it as a chance to get some rest after a hard day.  
That had been four hours ago. Now he was debating whether or not to go and fetch Gobber, I-told-you-so's be damned, and scouring the woods. He was getting more than a little concerned.

_Creak._

Stoick stiffened in his chair

_Thunk bump creak creak __screak._

Relief washed over Stoick's face, for about five seconds. Then suddenly questions came pouring in, each one bringing with it another till he started to get a headache. Where had Hiccup been? Was he alright? Had he _really_ thought he could sneak in the backdoor without him knowing about it?  
He stood up with a great shuffle of furs, and stomped over to the foyer. He reached for the door and-

"It was all Hiccup!"

-the door flung open in his face, revealing the face of the Most Innocent girl he had ever seen. Her eyes practically glowed with watery innocence. Behind her, Hiccup stood halfway up the stairs, one foot comically raised.

"What is the meaning of this? Where in god's name have you been?" Stoick folded his arms and fixed the two children with the patented Chiefstare. Azula's innocence faltered somewhat. Stoick frowned. She was such a handful, this child that had practically been dropped at his doorstep.

"Oh, uh, Dad!" Hiccup said, stumbling back down the stairs. "Dad. Dadadadadadad, uh, hi! I didn't want to wake you up, in fact we reaaally should be heading to bedcomeonAzulalet'sgo-"

"Hiccup," Stoick said, with the weight of a crashing boulder. The single word was enough to stop Hiccup's attempt to drag Azula away up the stairs. "Did you really think you could get away with this. Sneaking out behind me back-again!?"

Hiccup slumped.

"I told him it was a bad idea," Azula chimed in, suddenly finding her fingernails very interesting. "I knew you wouldn't have approved. But he was so insistent I had to come along. Wouldn't want the future chief getting hurt, now would we?"

Stoick gripped the bridge of his nose between finger and thumb. "And what," he said, "prevented you from telling me where you were going? What made you think it would be dangerous, girl?"

Azula blinked. "I-I-"

"Enough," Stoick said, straightening up. "I'm just glad you're alright, son. We'll talk about this in the morning...get to bed."


	2. Picking Partners(A fire doesn't build)

_Hello again people! It's time for another helping of WHAT IS THIS?_  
_Okay it's worth mentioning that I will use a lot of elements from the HTTYD books. For example, Gobber in the books taught a lot more than dragon fighting-so that's what he'll do here! They also get GENERAL VIKING EDUCATION._

_Also I just realized that FF deleted like, a good third of the last chapter. Well I'm too lazy to rewrite it so that's just too bad!_

Enjoy!

* * *

It was a miserable, windy, cold, blustery, wet, soggy kind of day. The sky was dark with water-laden clouds. The sea was roused to choppy anger. And the trees creaked with the sound of moaning, damp wind.

So all in all, it was a rather average day on Berk.

"ALL RIGHT YOU YOUNG'UNS! LINE UP!" Gobber the Belch belted out at the ragged line of young people that stood in front of him, shivering on the shoreline. Normally he'd have said something like "LINE UP YOU MISERABLE EXCUSES FOR VIKINGS" but he'd been asked to tone it down a bit this time. Pity.

"LET'S SEE WHO WE HAVE HERE!"

He looked up and down the line. And sighed internally. It looked like he had every fool child on Berk here in his "how to be a Viking" class. Not that he normally minded, but this lot...

"Whoa, is that a stick, or is it seal poop?" Ruffnut's voice floated to his ears, as she poked at something in the sand.

"Oh, I dunno," Tuffnut, her twin brother, responded. "Let me just lick it and find out. As old cousin Wicknut used to say, 'always trust the tongue."

...was probably going to look bad on his record.

"Great Thor above!" Gobber exclaimed, "why in gods name would ye' do that?"

"Uh, is that a trick question?" Tuffnut responded. Genuinely.

Oh boy. This was going to be a long day.

* * *

"Well this couldn't be better," Hiccup mumbled to himself, looking up and down at the same line of young vikings that Gobber had-though from a very different angle, namely, from underneath. See, Hiccup was just about the _smallest child there_. No wonder no-one would pair up with him, he couldn't pull logs or cut wood or even swing a hammer.

"Get together in pairs," Hiccup continued, imitating Gobber's accent, and swinging his arms around wildly, "Think carefully. Oh yeah, thanks Gobber, I will _definitely_ be able to do that. 'We're going to be making boats' oh sure. Because I look like the picture of a great burly shipwright."

Gobber wanted them to pair off and attempt to build a boat. Anyone who _didn't_ have a partner would be teamed up with Gobber himself-in short, a fate worse than death.

"THEY DON'T HAVE TO BE THE NEXT BERK FLAGSHIP!" Gobber yelled over the wind. "THEY JUST HAVE TO FLOAT AND SAIL. I THINK EVEN YOU LOT CAN DO THAT! NOW PAIR UP AND WORK IN TEAMS-I DON'T WANT ANYONE OFF ON THEIR OWN!"

Hiccup grumbled. "Oh yeah, solitude. How _horrible_." He looked up towards the group of other kids with more than a little envy. If only he'd been able to actually kill that Gronkle last night, everything would be different. Yeah, they'd be _lining_ _up _to hang out with him. Especially...  
His gaze lingered on a certain head of ethereal blonde hair.

Astrid.

Blue eyes the color of the ocean on a rare sunny day.

_Astrid_.

Glowing with a radiance that didn't belong on this miserable cold beach.

_Astrid_.

THE PERSON WHO WOULD HAVE BEEN MOST IMPRESSED WITH SOME DRAGONSLAYING.

ALSO ASTRID.

Instead he'd made a fool of himself, almost gotten killed, and ended up covered in ash and soot. Again. Furthermore, even Azula wasn't talking with him now. Instead she was standing slightly apart from the rest of the group, arms behind her back and _pointedly_ ignoring him. Hiccup didn't exactly like that, but really, what else was new?

Practically, that just left him with a pile of wood(to build a boat) and the need to find a partner(to help him build a boat). At least he had some ideas for the actual boat design, he just needed someone to help him move the things.  
"Simple enough. Just go up to someone and 'hey, would you like to hang out with me?' 'oh sure, no problem Hiccup!' 'thank you, Astrid!' 'and may I just say, you are looking exceptionally vikingly this morning!"

_See, that didn't sound so hard! Thinking of Astrid makes everything better._

But then he opened his eyes, and he was back on the beach, and she was still Freya's lost child, and he was still Hiccup. Most likely he'd just team up with Fishlegs and actually be able to get some work-

"Hey fishyface, you're with me!" Snotlout's voice rang out.

-or not.

That's when he realized...he was doomed.

* * *

"I think it's obvious," Azula said to, er, Astrid. That was her name? "We women have to stick together. I can already tell you're the most competent of this class. So congratulations, you are worthy to be my partner."

Astrid blinked, looking around awkwardly. "Thanks, I guess?"

"You're welcome," Azula said with a smile. She turned, and looked out over the ocean. "I think we'll make a very successful alliance."

"That's good. It's better than being stuck with Gobber," Astrid replied. "Anything would be better than that._ We_ should probably get started though."

_I think she's buying it so far..._

"I've often wanted a navy," Azula started, still staring out over the ocean. "Or even just a single boat. It'd only have the best on it, of course. Perhaps you could be there."

Astrid nodded slowly.

"Then I would sail the ocean until I found wherever my enemies were hiding, where I would FALL UPON THEM AND SET FIRE TO THEIR HOMES, AND BURN THEIR CITIES TO THE GROUND! THEIR WAILING WOULD BE A HYMN TO THEIR PITIFUL GODS! **I WOULD BE THE MOST POWERFUL CAPTAIN ON EARTH!** AHAHAHAHAHAHA!"  
Azula couldn't resist. She ignited to her hands and threw flames into the air above her, cackling like a madwoman. Oh, that mental image was just glorious!

Astrid meanwhile kind of just...stared, wide-eyed.  
"Wow, intense," she said at last, slowly, then... "I _love_ it!"

_Yes, appeal to violence, _Azula thought, even though that hadn't quite been the plan. _Now I have her wrapped around my little finger. Easy._

"Anyway, we should get to work," Astrid continued, gesturing to the pile of wood. "So how will we split this? Are you a hammer sort of girl, or do you prefer saws? I'll start sorting this wood, and you can cut it up."

Azula quirked an eyebrow. "Excuse...me?"

"How do you...want to help build? The boat?" Astrid clarified.

-er, this could be a problem.

"I'm sure whatever you have in mind would be...passable," Azula said, smiling patronisingly at Astrid. "But listen, Astrid, I think there's been a misunderstanding. Do I look like the sort of person who is capable of hurling around lumber?"

"But-"

"The answer is no, of course. I grew up with _servants_ who took care of my every need. Once you get used to that sort of life, you can't just switch over any time you please."-Azula paused for a second, as she made a show of kneeling beside the pile of wood-"I could try, of course, but I'd likely injure myself terribly...correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't that be your responsibility, as the more _experienced _one here?

Astrid frowned, and crossed her arms. "Y-yeah, but, basically-"

"I will, however, provide something far more useful than my limited physical assistance." Azula looked up at Astrid and smiled again, this time (she assumed) reassuringly.

"And that would be?"

"_Vision,_" Azula replied smugly.

Silence.

_She's thinking it over,_ Azula thought to herself. See, this wasn't so hard! _She'll see I'm right eventually._

Astrid's mouth opened and closed repeatedly, sucking in air. She looked dumbfounded.

_I didn't expect her to think so slowly though._

"So let me get this straight," Astrid said at last, finally finding her voice. "You want me to _do all the work_, while you just...what, sit there? On the sand?"

Azula stood up and shrugged slightly. "Yes. Some people are just better at certain things, I'm afraid."

That argument _would_ have worked in the Fire Nation. There, she was the daughter of the Firelord, whose name was whispered in terror around the world. There, she was expected to be brilliant; anything less would have been unacceptable. If Azula had proposed this plan _there_, it likely would have worked.

But here, on Berk, Astrid just shoved her over in a fit of childish frustration.  
"Screw that," she said, glowering down at the firebender. "Is this some kind of joke to you? This is our education! This is where we'll be learning the skills we'll use _our whole lives!_"

Azula propped herself up on her hands, emotions flashing across her face like clouds on a very windy day(which coincidentally, it was.) She was genuinely shocked. But more than that...

"You.." she said in a long, slow voice. As she spoke, she rose to her feet, _actual_ fire blazing in her eyes. "You are going to _regret_ attacking your betters."

* * *

Things were going well for Gobber, all things considered. Snotlout had matched up with Fishlegs, and the two were shaping up the framework of their boat. The Thorston twins had ended up with each other(of course) and were beginning work on their own watercraft. Hiccup was by himself, but that was how it always ended up, one way or another. Nothing out of the ordinary.

So all in all, things were going well.

_Were._

But now...oh boy,_ now_ he was holding back a furious, soot-covered Astrid with one hand(hook), and a squirming, wriggling dragon-girl in the other. Waaayy too much fire in her veins, this one-

"SAVAGE!" Azula hissed, punching a plume of orange fire at Astrid, who threw herself down to avoid it.

-literally, too much fire in her veins. Gobber gulped. That was just just unnatural; it gave him the heebie-jeebies something fierce.

"OUTSIDER!" Astrid yelled, jumping to her feet. Gobber yanked her back before she could get her hands around Azula's neck.

"PEASANT!" from Azula.

"MONSTER!" from Astrid.

"ANIMAL!" Azula again. "YOU'RE LUCKY TO EVEN STAND IN MY PRESENCE, YOU MISERABLE-"

**"Alright, enough!" **Gobber boomed, his own patience starting to crack. "The only one who is allowed to throw curses at my students is _me! _And as both of you are definitely _not me_, you're going to hafta' play nice, or I'll have you cleaning the dragon pens till next winter!"

"But she-" Astrid began.

"I don't care!" Gobber replied. "There's no excuse for acting like hooligans!"

Ruffnut piped in. "Uh, but, we are hooligans though? It's like, the name of the tribe."

Gobber elected to ignore that for now. "There will be be no biting, stabbing, hitting, setting on fire, or otherwise maiming yer' fellow students! Do you both understand?"

Silence.

"Well?"

Finally, with a loud sigh, Azula straightened up and brushed her hair back. "Fine. I admit it, it wasn't becoming of a princess to react so poorly. I couldn't have known you'd respond so strongly to my suggestion, but I should have guessed by your..._position."_

Astrid bristled. "Your _suggestion?"_

"I miscalculated," Azula continued. "For that you have my apologies. I won't disrupt class again."

"There, see?" Gobber said, relaxing his grip on Azula's shoulders. "Easy as yak pie!"

"Ugh, fine," Astrid said, shrugging Gobber's arm off of her. "I guess I'm sorry too. Just be glad Gobber stopped me in time."

"For that I will be forever grateful," Azula said with a face full of Suitably Chastised Shame(™). "In fact, Gobber, if you don't mind, I think I'll find a different partner. The Chief's son doesn't look like he's found anyone yet?"

Gobber looked over at Hiccup, who was watching all this intently. In fact...everyone was. They'd gathered a crowd.  
"Alright alright! Back to work! Fine, Azula, you go over with Hiccup. I don't want to hear anything like this again."

Azula looked up at him and actually _smirked. _"Thank you. Astrid, I suppose that doesn't leave anyone for you...such a shame."

Then she sauntered off, leaving Gobber feeling like he'd been played.

* * *

"Couldn't stay away, huh?" Hiccup drawled.

Azula looked over at him and smiled. "She told me she didn't want to end up with Gobber. She told me her _weakness._ But I acted first. Now _she_ has to suffer through the humiliation and shame of having no-one! Perhaps she'll recover from this-perhaps not. Ehehehehehehehehe!"  
She broke into a long chuckle, until finally she righted herself. "ANYWAY!"

She looked over at Hiccup, who looked like he had deflated. What was he so down for?

"You should get to work."

Hiccup nodded dumbly, still with that despairing look on his face.

"Oh come on, aren't you happy to have _me_ as a partner, instead of Astrid? She was a terrible person anyway."

In response, Hiccup fell over backwards into the sand, and groaned.

Azula huffed. These people were all a bunch of weirdos.


	3. Set Sail(Row Harder)

_Q:Wow you had three chapters of this?_  
_A:Yes, yes I did._

_NoneofthecharactersherebelongtomeIassumeyouallknowthat_

_Azula and Hiccup take their boat out for a literal spin. "The Hopeful Puffin" name comes from the books, in case you were wondering._

* * *

It had taken a few days to get even a simple boat seaworthy. During that time, the weather had soured into a perpetual and miserable rain, the kind that soaks through whatever you happen to be wearing and lays its cold rainy hands on your skin. This of course meant that most _normal_ people wouldn't even consider going sailing in such weather.

There was a strong case to be made that the vikings of the Hairy Hooligan tribe were very much _not normal._

They were sailing anyway.

Hiccup was straining against the oars as best he could, exerting himself in a way he rarely did just to get their boat to go straight. The Azula/Hiccup boat, _The Hopeful_ _Puffin_(Hiccup's name, Azula would be quick to interject), was a slippy, slidey, roundish sort of boat, that seemed far more interested in spinning around in circles than going wherever its captain wanted. This was still better than Hiccup had expected, considering...

"We're being left behind," Azula said helpfully, uncurling herself from a rainsoaked ball long enough to see that the gloomy shapes of the other boats were further away than they had been the last time she had looked.

...considering he had done ALL THE WORK.

"Yeah, I can see that," Hiccup grunted shortly.

Azula looked back at him as she curled herself back up, trying to shelter against the rain by huddling against the mast. It wasn't working.  
"So...row faster."

"Row faster, she says," Hiccup mumbled. "I'm cold, she says. I'm getting on Hiccup's nerves, she says."

"I never said that," Azula said, scrunching her eyebrows.

Hiccup said nothing in response, opting instead to huff and pull on the oars just that _little_ bit harder than normal. His arms burned, but he didn't want to be left behind.

"You know, I never said I wouldn't row," Azula said, adjusting her seat.

"Well thank you, for bringing that up two hours in," Hiccup said. "Oh yeah, that would have been real useful information a while back."

"It's more along the lines of...I can't," Azula replied, suddenly finding the nauseating churning of the waves very interesting. Her voice dropped to a whisper. "I don't really know how."

"Yeah well, neither do I," Hiccup said.

Azula stared at him.

"What, you-you looked at me and thought 'that looks like a big, burly, seafaring man! I bet he knows all about the mysterious seafaring arts!" Hiccup continued, grunting as he rowed. "NOPE! Fooled you. I have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA WHAT I'M DOING!"

The last words were said in a yell, not directed at Azula, but at Gobber, who was sailing by. _His_ boat was a work of art-and not just because it had Astrid on it, pulling ropes while her blonde hair whipped in the wind-

"I BELIEVE IN LEARNING ON THE JOB!" Gobber yelled back, as they sailed off at frankly embarrassing speeds. Hiccup wondered if Azula's revenge was soured somewhat by this. A quick glance at the sheer amount of _nonchalance _Azula was projecting told him that yes, it did bother her that Astrid had such a superior vessel. "DON'T GET LEFT BEHIND, THERE ARE SEADRAGONS ABOUT!"

"THANKS..." Hiccup began, then broke off into a mumble. "_Thanks for nothing._"

He looked over at Azula sitting in front of him. She was still pointedly looking away...though, as if sensing his stare, she turned in his direction.

"What is it?"

_We would have a better boat if you'd helped me a little bit._

But Hiccup didn't _say_ that, of course. He just huffed and continued to row. How much longer would this exercise go on for? Would he really have to row all the way? He really would appreciate it if Azula would volunteer, but he honestly wasn't sure how well she'd even do. For all he knew, they'd end up even further behind.  
His impression of his spirit-blessed foster-sibling was that she could shoot a lot of fire somehow(which was admittedly super cool), but wasn't exactly competent at anything else. He wasn't sure how he felt about that. On one hand, it was _really nice_ to not be the only person who didn't know how to do anything. But on the other hand, she was an infuriating person.  
Also she had attacked Astrid. He was still mad at her for that.

"Are you angry at me?" Azula said to him, frowning.

Hiccup looked up sharply. Had she just...read his mind? Could she do that?

"You _are_ angry with me. It's written all over your face," she continued, leaning forwards and scrutinizing him with her sharp golden eyes. It was a little creepy. "Why? Are you angry that I'm not rowing?"

Hiccup shrugged. "It's not-"

"Is it because you had to make this "boat" all by yourself?"

"Well, that was _very_ annoying," Hiccup began, hunching his shoulders in towards himself. "But-"

"What then?" Azula huffed, rocking back in her seat. She reached up and brushed water out of her soaking hair; where she touched, the water steamed. "Just spit it out."

"Look, you're the one who assumes I'm angry."

"Because you _are_," Azula simpered.

Hiccup gripped the oars just a little tighter. "Well to be honest I'm getting a little angry now, yeah."

"Aw, do I make you mad?" Azula said in a false-patronizing voice. "Is it because I got into a fight with your blonde friend?"

Silence.

"Ahah! That was it!" Azula smirked...then frowned. "Well that's unfair. She did hit me first."

"Seriously?" Hiccup said, leaning forward. "That's your excuse? You were being rude!"

Azula thrust her chin out defensively, hands curling into tight little balls. "She _shoved me_. Do you seriously have a problem with me defending myself? If we were back home-"

"Astrid shoves people all the time, and no-one's ever tried to set _her on fire before!"  
_  
Azula stared at him like _he_ was the one spouting crazy nonsense. "Well I can't speak for how you do things here. All I did was-"

"No!" Hiccup said, pulling his shoulders up against himself. He adjusted himself into position with more...let's call it leverage. He was defending his future wife here! Years later, he'd talk about this and Astrid would be all 'oh Hiccup you were so sweet' and he'd be all 'it was nothing for you babe'-  
_Ahem_.  
Anyway. This had to be done the right way, not slouching in the bottom of a waterlogged _Hopeful Puffin_.  
"H-how would you like it if-if I just didn't do anything for you-what if I just stopped rowing, huh? How would you feel?"

"Don't make threats you can keep," Azula said. She even rolled her eyes.

Well. Shots were fired now. Hiccup pulled the oars into the boat, crossed them in front of him so that neither ends were touching the water, then crossed his own arms. Without a guiding hand, the _Hopefull Puffin_ quickly began to spin in a slow, nauseating circle. But Hiccup didn't care, oh no, he had _something to prove_ now. He looked up at Azula and narrowed his eyes at her defiantly.  
"So...so what? What are you going to do now?"

Azula screwed up her mouth. "Are you serious? What do you think you're doing?"

_Something stupid._

"Oh-oh, I'm not doing anything," he said, fixing her with his green eyes. That was probably a mistake–gods, her glare was frightening. He could already feel his resolve weakening. But Hiccup may not have had the strongest arms, or the fastest legs, but he had inherited something from his father after all: sheer viking stubbornness.

"You realize that we'll be left behind?"

"Yes," Hiccup replied, not budging.

"Fine," Azula said, clenching her fist. "Let's say you play your little game. You win, you make your point, blah blah blah. But now we're in the ocean with no way of knowing which way is home. So you can pick up the oars and start rowing, or you can die of starvation out here in the ocean. Your choice."

Gods, she looked smug as she said that. So smug that, even though it was technically right, Hiccup couldn't help but feel he _had_ to have at least a partial victory here. HIS PRIDE DEMANDED IT.

So he raised one oar over his head and chucked it into the ocean.

"Oh no," he said, looking Azula right in the eyes. "My arm slipped."

"Wha-" Azula sputtered, looking at the oar in almost disbelief. The waves were slowly drifting it away. "YOU IDIOT! GO GET IT!"

Hiccup, feeling more gutsy than he ever had in his entire life, crossed his arms, sat back, and said "you go get it."

Azula actually stood up in the boat, which was impressive considering how much it was rocking around. "You think you can make a fool out of _me?_ That's a miscalculation!"  
At her words, twin spheres of orange flame materialized on her hands, hot and crackling and begging to be turned loose. They sputtered sparks in the increasing wind, reflecting the fire in her eyes. Azula's eyes were suddenly wild and dangerous, narrowed to golden pinpricks.

The threat felt very real. But...

"And then what, you'll jump out, grab the oars, and row back?" Hiccup said(though he still scootched back in his seat). "Yeah, I'm sure burning me alive will make you _real_ popular back on Berk. They might even give you a medal, who knows?"

Azula faltered, though just for an instant. "I can–"

_Thunk_.

Something struck the bottom of the boat, causing Azula to lose her balance. She wobbled, and stumbled to her knees, half-way out the boat. Hiccup half-rose in alarm.

"What was–"

_Thunk_.

Another bump, harsher than before. Harsh enough that it knocked Hiccup forwards...and harsh enough to knock Azula up, sideways, and into the water. Into the churning, stormy water.  
To say that Hiccup was worried would be a massive understatement. The scenario was playing out in his head–Azula drowned, and himself graduating from 'Hiccup the Useless' to 'Hiccup the Horrible'. Gods, what if she couldn't swim? He had been picking on her for being a pain, but he didn't want her _hurt_! He rushed to the side of the _Hopeful Puffin_ and looked out.

"AZULA?"

"G-GET ME OUT!" he looked down and saw, to his relief, Azula was clinging to the side of the boat like a drowning cat.

"Uh, sure, l-let me just..." he reached around, grabbed the remaining oar, and lowered it down to her. It also smacked her in the face. "Whoops."

"YOU–" Azula began, but a wave washed over her as she was speaking.

"Hey uh, while you're down there..." Hiccup said, leaning over the side. "I mean, you can get the other oar now, right? It's right over there!"

Azula glared, and pulled herself over the side without Hiccup's help, sputtering and sneezing. Wow, he wouldn't have thought she could pull that off! He grinned nervously at her. "So, uh, sorry about–"

Suddenly something yanked the end of the Hiccup's oar, and before he could react, both it and he were _pulled_ down into the churning waves.

Yeah, you know those Seadragons Gobber had mentioned? Not just idle talk. And everyone knows seadragons like to prey on the weakest, easiest food they can find. Dying whales. Old sharks. And tiny children on badly-made boats.  
Like a nightmare it emerged from the waves, blue-green and moaning like a dying man. It had pinprick-sized eyes far towards the end of its snout, but it's most prominent feature were its rows of oddly-blunt teeth that protruded from it's lower jaw.

Hiccup, bobbing around in the water(still clutching the oar, remember, the oar is very important) could only think: _Doot-dee-dah, we're dead._

"Hiccup!"

The voice grabbed his attention. It was Azula, of course, because all the other boats were _way_ out of range because some stubborn viking idiot had decided to stop rowing. Wow. What a dumbie.

"What do I do?"

"Uhhhhhhhhh I don't know!" Hiccup said, looking around frantically as the dragon glided closer, not in any particular hurry. "Some help saving me from my imminent death would be nice?"

In response, Azula stood up, brushed the wet hair out of her eyes, and _punched_ a blooming orange fireball at the creature's neck. It exploded in a spray of mist and water. Hiccup had to wonder, would that work? Dragons are fireproof, right?  
Note for the future: Seadragons are not fireproof.

The dragon screamed, more out of surprise than anything, and dived beneath the waves to escape from the sudden heat. Azula stood with one arm extended, a surprised look on her face. What was _she_ surprised for? That was about the most beautiful thing Hiccup had ever seen.

"Hand me the oar," Azula said, breaking out of her stupor and leaning over the side of the boat. "I'll pull you up."

The oar? Hiccup looked down to the oar he was clutching. Oh right, this oar. She wanted it. So, with as much leverage as he could muster, he tossed it to her.  
Hmm. She probably had meant for him to hand her the _end_ of the oar, so she could pull him up. Wow, his brain must be waterlogged.

Azula blinked. "WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH THIS?"

"I DON'T KNOW, IMPROVISE!"

"STOP SCREAMING!"

"I'M NOT SCREAMING, YOU'RE SCREAMING!" Hiccup...screamed.

"I'M PANICKING!" Azula screeched back, "YOU'RE SCREAMING! THERE'S A DIFFERENCE!"

"WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE!" Hiccup said back to her. Gods, he really did want to know...

Azula fumbled with the oar before realizing that she could just extend it back towards him. That, of course, is when the seadragon decided to pop back up.

"DID YOU MISS ME?" the sea dragon said. (Probably.)

He was greeted by Azula crashing the oar over his scaly head. Rude. He retreated back into the water in indignation. Azula meanwhile _kept hitting the water_ in a panic-fueled frenzy even though the dragon was gone.

"THIS"–_whack_–"IS"–_whack_–"PANICKING!"

"ACK!" Hiccup yelled, as he came very near to losing an ear. "Watch it!"

Finally, with a desperate lunge Hiccup managed to grasp the oar, and with a mighty pull, Azula yanked him onto the boat. He flopped down over the side, soaked, wet, and cold, and just gasped. His lungs felt like they were going to burst.  
A touch on the back of his head made him look up. Azula stood over him, dripping wet and panting almost as hard as he was.

"A flawless rescue," she said.


	4. You'll what?(Leave it to Me)

_Rain poured down over the grey ocean. The intrepid crew of the Hopeful Puffin made their painstaking way back to Berk._

_"This really...looked a lot easier," Azula's piping voice rang out, muffled as it was by the rain. She had the oar, and was clearly struggling with it._

_"Y-yeah well. W-we only h-have one oar," Hiccup said. He was curled in a ball in the back of the boat, shivering. _He_ didn't have firebending to warm himself up. In fact, he felt like he was going to die. "S-sorry about that."_

* * *

_Berk was close._

_"Y-you'd be a good friend if you weren't so mean to people."_

_Azula looked back from her task. "I'm not mean. I'm just an outsider. They treat me like a joke."_

_"Well, at least we have that in common," Hiccup drawled, pulling his coat closer to himself. He grinned. "I guess you could say...we're in the same boat?"_  
_He looked up at her, as if saying "eh?"_

_Hiccup's sailing companion looked back at him, eyebrows raised. "Are you serious?"_

* * *

OOO: One day, a warm fire, and many hot drinks later...

* * *

_Thank the gods that hellish sailing lesson is over, _Hiccup thought to himself, snuggling under his warm, comfortable blankets. _It's so much warmer and more comfortable in here. Warm, toasty, and smokey. Like a fire..._

Wait, smokey? Hiccup suddenly realized that this warmth was a little _too intense_.

Snapping awake, Hiccup hurriedly rolled out of bed. Unfortunately his blankets were still wrapped around him, so they tangled around his legs and sent him to the floor in an ungainly sprawl. But it wasn't all bad. From there he could see that there was a fire under his bed. Yep, an actual fire, with flames and everything. Under his bed.

Actually, that was pretty bad too.

"FIRE!"

Twisting around in un-vickingly panic, Hiccup resorted to whacking the fire with his blankets like a madman, beating the poor thing to death. It was only a smouldering pile of sticks and leaves, but he took no chances. He whacked and whacked until it was fully dead. Strangely enough though, no-one responded to all the noise he was making.

Finally, the fire was out. But that just left Hiccup awake in the grey hours of the morning, covered in soot and rolling around on the floor. He struggled to his feet. What a waste of a perfectly good morning...the young viking picked up a half-burned leaf and looked at it with bleary eyes.

How had this even happened?

* * *

"I have _no_ idea," Azula said, leaning forward at him from across the dinner table, Innocence™ written all over her face.

Hiccup had stomped downstairs, fully intending to wake her up and wring some answers out of her. But instead, he'd found her fully composed, sitting in a chair at the empty dinner table like she'd been waiting for him. She'd done her hair up in her metal fire hair-thingy, she was dressed nicely–she'd even lit all the candles and placed them all on the table, like this was some shady cult meeting.  
This was weird.

"But you're up, so that's convenient," she finished.

Hiccup really didn't know how to react to this. "Convenient, eh?"

"Yes. Sit," Azula replied. She gestured to a chair. "Unless you'd prefer to stand. We need to talk."

He meekly scooted out a chair and sat down. "We do?"

"Yes," Azula said. She folded her hands beneath her nose, resting both elbows on the table. "I've taken the liberty of listening in to some of the opinions around town. The general sentiment is–"

"Wha-when did you do this?" Hiccup said, leaning back in his seat. When had she had the time to be doing _that_? After they'd got back from being at sea, everything had been a blur. All he could really remember was being wrapped in a blanket and thrown _extremely_ close to a fire to warm up. But apparently Azula had been making...better use of her time.

Azula herself looked exasperated. "Yesterday. People talk, Hiccup. Especially when two children stumble in half-dead from the ocean. Anyway, as I was saying...from what I've gathered, people have started to...associate us."

Hiccup looked confused. "What?" He wasn't really sure he knew what she was talking about, but he had a sinking feeling already.

"I've become 'that strange girl that hangs around the Chief's son," Azula looked to the side. "It's an upgrade, I suppose. But it's problematic."

"Problematic how?"

"You're _lame_," Azula replied bluntly.

Hiccup scrunched down in his seat. "Well thank you for summing that up." He couldn't entirely hide the hurt in his voice.

Azula rolled her eyes. "Don't be like that. You're honestly the best person for me to be associated with in the long run anyway." She fixed him with her golden eyes, leaning forwards ever so slightly.

Hiccup blinked. "Really?"

"Yes," Azula nodded. "You're the future chief after all, correct? So really I'm ahead of the curve, getting into your good graces while you're young. It could serve me well...if I...don't find a way to get back home."

"Yeah well, glad I could be of service," Hiccup snarked, defensively. That wasn't something he wanted to hear.

The firebender smiled at him, oblivious. "That's the spirit. You should use who you are to your advantage. I always tried to tell my brother that, but he never listened to me. You remind me of Zuzu, actually." If one was to squint, one could almost imagine a flicker of loneliness in Azula's eyes.  
"But you're in luck. I shall help you become, well, _better."_

Now Hiccup was really confused. "What?"

"You're welcome," Azula said brightly. "Since you are kind of a laughingstock, it reflects poorly on me by proxy. I'll help you lose your poor reputation and climb the ladder of social greatness."

"I-I'm starting to get emotional whiplash over here," Hiccup said with a squint, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. "How would you even help me? It's not like I've never tried to-to fit in. That's why I wanted to, er, slay a dragon."

Azula nodded, eyes closed. "Yes, a worthy objective. Where I come from those who slay dragons are regarded as heroes. To do so requires unbelievable strength and skill. The names of warriors who slew dragons are remembered by children hundreds of years later," she opened her eyes, letting out a long breath. "I can see why you'd want to do that. My uncle killed a dragon, and everyone respects _him_ even though he's a fuddy-duddy."

"Yeah. My dad popped the head off a dragon right after he was born," Hiccup shrugged in agreement. "You have no idea how often I've heard that story."

_Silence_. Azula stared at him, blank faced and wide eyed.

"Where is dad, anyway?" Hiccup looked around, as if expecting Stoick to pop up from beneath the table.

"He's out. Excuse me, he did _what_?" Azula finally found her voice.

Hiccup shrugged again. "That's what they all say. Then there's me, who-"

"Yes yes, whatever," Azula said shortly, narrowing her eyes and looking off to the side. She seemed a little put off, as if she was frantically recalculating something. "Anyway, as I was saying before you distracted me-"

"Sorry."

"Whatever. Anyway, I was going to say you should aim a little lower. What you need is a _following. _Fortunately I'm great at getting people to follow me. I'll help you."

"You...are great at getting followings, what?" Hiccup looked less than convinced. "You?"

Azula huffed. "_Yes_. All you need is a push in the right direction. A heroic moment, if you will. All you need be is alert," she looked into his eyes and smiled, no doubt meant to be reassuring...but it gave Hiccup chills.  
"_I'm sure the opportunity will present itself._"

* * *

OOO: Approximately one breakfast later...

* * *

"Snotlout ooh! Snotlout aaah!" the young viking hummed to himself, making his way through the streets of Berk without a care in the world. And why not? Why should Snotlout, greatest viking who ever lived, have things like _cares?_ Cares were for _girls. _Just like tears. Or feelings.

It was a rather windy day, and various leaves and bits of debris blew past him as he walked. Snotlout paid them no mind. But then, suddenly, a piece of parchment caught his eye. It blew towards him, carried by the wind, and bumped against his leg. Snotlout leaned down and picked it up.

"Ew, junk," he said, throwing it over his shoulder. Then he continued on his merry way, heading towards the docks to see what the traders had brought in today.

Suddenly the piece of parchment flew at him again, this time catching on his face. "ACK! What the-" he peeled it off, and again chucked it to the side. "Alright, who's leaving this stuff out like this? Geez, some people have no respect for the environment."

Again he started humming, cavorting towards–

The piece of parchment, this time tied around a rock, came hurling out of some nearby bushes and smacked him square on the face.

"OW!" he said loudly, falling on his backside. "MY FACE! NOT MY FACE! THE ONE THING YOU DON'T HIT! SOMEONE HELP!" He rolled around for a little bit, clutching his head. _Finally_, he pulled himself together.

"Alright Snotlout, it's okay, rugged-but-scarred is in right now, you'll be fine," he patted his cheeks–then noticed the parchment-turned-missile. "ALRIGHT! Who threw this! Ruffnut! Tuffnut! I'm thinking of you!"

* * *

Far away, pushing sheep over, Ruffnut and Tuffnut sneezed simultaneously.

* * *

Snotlot looked down at the parchment, and untied it gingerly and carefully. "Probably has a snake or something inside..."

But it didn't. Inside was a message, written in some _girly_ handwriting.

_-Oh my most rugged viking,_ it read, _how I have admired you from afar. I long to profess my feelings to you, but alas, I have hidden them far away beneath a veil of pride and false bravado. Only if I was truly alone could I tell you how I feel._

_Please, meet me under the blasted willow, in the woods, under the light of the setting sun. Do not be late._

_-Astrid._

"...Wow," Snotlout breathed, his eyes widening in wonder. "These are a lot of words-yeah, too nerdy. I'm not reading this. NICE TRY NUTS!"  
Then he chucked the message over his shoulder, and carried on his way.

The nearby bush let out a sound that was remarkably similar to that of a palm striking a forehead.

* * *

Azula carefully climbed out of the bushes, looking both ways to make sure she wasn't being observed. She brushed herself off. That hadn't worked at all. The plan had been fairly simple.

Step 1: Take advantage of the obvious attraction Snotlout had for Astrid, and use it to lure him into the woods.  
Step 2: Trap Snotlout, in a pit or something. This shouldn't have been too hard, she knew where he would be and when he'd get there.  
Step 3: Leave him there, preferably till he was desperate but before he got really hurt, and then  
Step 4: Have Hiccup rescue him. By coincidence. Hiccup always went out into the woods. That would have been believeable...

It was such a good plan! It was simple, elegant, and effective. Hiccup didn't even know about it, so it couldn't be traced back to him, and it was unlikely it'd be connected to her...as long as she was able to get rid of that letter. But Snotlout had gone and _ruined_ it. Azula huffed. She'd never forgive him.

Oh well, time to move on to plan B. She better get rid of that letter now though, before...

She turned around just in time to see a gust of wind pick up the letter and blow it away downwind–where it stuck to possibly the worst thing it could have stuck to. Stoick's leg. The dragon-head-popper himself. Azula wasn't sure she believed that story, but she also didn't want to find out if it was true or not: beyond that, he was someone who would see straight through that phony letter.  
So yes, this was bad.

"THAT'S NOT YOURS!" she yelled, racing over and swiping the parchment away. It unfortunately tore in two places, leaving part of it in Stoick's hand. "It's a message. For...Snothead. Snotlout." She smiled at him.

_Ash, I didn't mean to say that._

Stoick looked down at the message in his hand. It read "_Oh my most rugged viking_, _how I have admired you from afar. I long to profess my feelings to you, but alas, I have hidden them far away beneath a veil of pride and false bravado..." _The rest was torn off.

The chief looked up from the parchment at her. "This is for Snotlout?"

"Y-yes," Azula replied, gritting her teeth. Agni, this wasn't how this should have gone. Stoick's brow furrowed as he looked at her.

He leaned down. "Look, Azula, I don't know you very well, but...ah, how do I say this, Snotlout, he's..." he paused, rubbing a temple with one huge hand. "He's not...good."

Azula's eyed widened. "You think–no. Nononononono. No," she said vehemently, shaking her head. "That's–That's not what's going on here–"

Stoick looked down to the parchment in his hand, then back at her. He raised an eyebrow.

"I know what that looks like," Azula said. She yanked the remaining parchment away, and set the offending thing on fire. "But it's not what you think. It's–It's...complicated." Azula winced at the terrible excuse. She was normally better than this.

_Time to abort._

"I have...to go...do something else," she said suddenly, turning around and racing off.

_Not my most brilliant exit, but my fastest one._

She didn't look back–this was probably the single most embarrassing moment of her life. Once she was a fair distance away, Azula pulled herself around a tree, and threw her back against it. She stood there, frozen, for a good moment. It didn't look like Stoick had followed. Good. She needed a new plan. Agni, getting Hiccup to play the hero was going to be far too difficult if this was any indication. Maybe what he needed was just some basic STAND STRAIGHT AND STOP MUMBLING instead.

But what kind of princess abandoned her plans after one foiled attempt? No. She could still pull this off. She just needed a better scenario. And better execution. Yes.

This could still work.

* * *

Meanwhile Stoick stood where Azula had left him, thanking all the gods that he'd had a son and not a daughter. Girls were so complicated.

* * *

_Author's Note: I swear these things are too easy to write. This, much like the last two, was originally longer, but I decided to break it up. I DIDN'T WANT A 5000+ WORD CHAPTER OUT OF NOWHERE OKAY._

_R&R peeps!_


	5. What?(I said, Leave it To Me)

Today was going to be a good day.

_SLAM!_

Hiccup jumped as Azula rushed into the house at about a million miles an hour. She looked around the room hurriedly till she spotted him, scribbling away at a parchment at the table. He hurriedly covered the parchment with his skinny arms. Gods, that barely helped anything.  
"A-Azula! Azula..." he drawled, looking around at nothing in particular. "Can I help you with anything...at all?"

"Yes, actually," Azula replied. She sounded out of breath for some reason. "I need to confirm something...tell me a lie."

"Saywhat?" Hiccup said, eyes widening. "Our talks are getting stranger and–"

"Any lie at all. Now."

Hiccup stumbled mentally, drawing a complete blank. "Er, uh, well, a lie...?" _Come on brain, think of something!_ "Uhhhh...you look...great this morning?" He grinned awkwardly, showing his crooked teeth.

Azula blinked. "_That's_ your lie?"

"Er, no, wait, let me try again–"

"No, no need, that answered my question," Azula said, huffing. She looked a little annoyed. "I suppose I'll have to keep this to myself."

And then there was silence. Hiccup nodded awkwardly, adjusting himself in his seat. Did he look casual? No. He sat straighter than he had in his life, arms folded protectively over his piece of parchment. _Don't ask don't ask don't–_

"What are you drawing?" Azula said abruptly. She leaned forwards in an attempt to peer over his arms.

_Gods, cut me a break..._"Ahhh, nothing, it's nothing, don't worry about it," he said, grabbing the paper and stuffing it under the table. "It's just...something stupid."

"Then you shouldn't mind showing me!" she replied, his efforts to hide the parchment only spurring on her attempts to _see_ it.

"No!"

_"Yes!" _Finally(she was a lot stronger than she looked, Hiccup realized) Azula wrested it out from beneath the table and yanked it away with one hand. Then she proceeded, to Hiccup's chagrin, to use her other arm to hold back his attempts at recovering his possession while she scanned it over. Hiccup fell silent, his face reddening.

"What is it?" Azula said, turning back to face him. She proffered the parchment back to him. On it was scribbled a bunch of lines and angles, that, while crude, was clearly meant to be a diagram of some kind.

"I-it's nothing..." Hiccup said, taking it back, and setting it face down on the table. "It's just–you said earlier, I needed a heroic moment. Well, I'm...I'm not exactly the picture of a big, heroic viking, you may have noticed...so I thought, maybe I could _build_ something that would let me do what everyone else can. B-but better. Gods, it was just an idea..."

Azula narrowed her eyes at him, stepping away and sitting on the table. "Can you? Build things like that?"

"I don't know-maybe?" Hiccup shrugged. "I've been pretty good with my hands–I mean, I built a boat even though I've never seen a diagram before or anything, and I had to do the work of two people. Gobber's mentioned taking me on as his apprentice, so...I don't know. Like I said, it was just an idea."

"And here I thought you were just drawing some _girl_," she replied with a pointed grin, tilting her head. "If you fail, you know you're only going to be a bigger laughingstock. It's a gamble."

Hiccup was silent, but he could feel the air leaking out of him.

But then Azula looked off to the side, at the wall for some reason. "I believe in taking risks. You should try. Use whatever you can, however you can. That's how I got better than my brother at firebending." She crossed her arms and nodded, evidently proud of that fact.

Hiccup thought about it half-heartedly. He still didn't know how she could _do _that crazy fire thing, and wasn't sure how to ask. But hey, it was nice to have her...confidence? Approval? Whatever.

"Anyway," she continued, scooting off the table. "I must be going. I have work to do." Then she turned, and ran off as fast as she'd come in, SLAMMING the door behind her. What a strange girl.

* * *

Azula ran down the hill from Stoick's house, in a rush. She needed to catch her prey(Snotlout) before he left the docks. After that, things would just get too complicated for her to pull off what she needed to. So Azula needed to hurry.

She began to slow as she took note of a tall, dead tree growing beside the docks. Azula had noticed it earlier, when they had been heading to the shore to build those idiotic boats. She'd thought it looked like a hazard then, tall and unsteady, with dry branches just waiting to break. Now, while those qualities had in no way diminished, she saw this tree as an _ally_.

Stopping beneath it, Azula looked around hurriedly. Once she was satisfied that no-one was paying attention, Azula gripped the lowermost branches, and began to climb. The tree _was_ unsteady. In fact, she could feel it rock beneath her feet, almost enough to dissuade her from her mission. But she was light, her grip was firm, and so she carried on. Hand over hand, branch over branch, till the ground was an unsteady, nauseating distance beneath her.

_This should be high enough._

She stopped, and climbed out on a branch-as far as she dared. It creaked uncertainly, but its base was thick enough to support her weight and then some. Azula then sat up, unbuttoned the (borrowed) fur jacket she was wearing...and hooked it firmly around the branches. This accomplished, she shimmed back to the base of the branch.

Hmm. Azula eyed the branch directly beneath her. It was a convenient little staircase of branches, making climbing up easy enough, if one could stomach the height So she kicked the branch repeatedly until it broke off. Then...she slipped off the branch, and fell into the open air.

At the last second, only feet from a _nasty_ landing, Azula flared her chi. Flames _exploded_ from her feet and palms, powerful enough that the knockback slowed her fall. She still landed heavily, one hand touching the ground. But it would have been much worse for anyone else.

Azula stood up quickly, brushed herself off, then...sat down.

And waited.

* * *

Snotlout was still cavorting his way down the dock. Slung over his shoulder was a burlap sack, containing the results of his shopping–a few rocks of interesting colors, and a new pair of shoes–and it was starting to feel heavy. Good thing he was heading home.

But, what should he see as he journeyed back to his humble abode? Why nothing, nothing but a MAIDEN IN NEED OF SERVICE! Azula, the strange-yet-fairly-cute person that had appeared out of nowhere a while back, sat forlornly beneath that old eyesore of a tree. She looked up at him, hope beaming in her eyes. That was a I-like-you-but-I-don't-want-to-admit-it look if he'd ever seen one. It was really odd how commonly he saw that expression of the girls of Berk.

_Comes with the territory of being The Snotmeister, _he thought to himself.

Swaggering forward, he leaned casually against the selfsame tree. Azula looked him up and down, no doubt taking in his rugged good looks, chiseled features, and sensitive yet passionate eyes. He winked. "Now don't call me an expert, but you look like you could use some Snot in your life."

Azula stared at him, blank faced for a bare second. Then her expression shifted to one of helpless frustration, her entire demeanour seeming to shift. That was a bit weird, but Snotlout had a weird effect on girls.

"It's my coat," she said, in that strange voice of hers. "The wind..." she gestured around, vaguely pointing at the air around her. Snotlout knew what she meant. It was a very windy day. But for the wind to take her coat up so high...wow.

"Looks like quite a climb," he remarked, looking up at the old tree.

Azula looked away, eyes full of bashful shame. "I'm...I'm afraid of heights."

Snotlout nodded, bringing his gaze down to look her over. "Ahahaha, I see what's going on here. I knew you could use the assistance of the pinnacle of modern man. Fortunately–" he spread his arms out, displaying his godly form "–he. Has. Arrived."

"Truly?" Azula breathed back at him. Wow, he was _on his game today_. She was practically hanging off his arm! And not in the "I'm about to throw you" way that Astrid did!

"Yep," he said, cracking his knuckles. "I'm pretty much the best at everything around here. Hold up, I'll have your jacket down before you can say...a word." With that, he set down his sack, gripped the lowermost branches, and began to shimmy up the tree. Whoa, that wasn't good. The tree rocked _way_ more than he thought it would. But, a glance down at Azula steeled his resolve. Nerves steadied, he pushed himself higher.

"Careful," Azula said from behind him. "It's very...unsteady."

* * *

Azula watched him climb, doing her best to hold back her smirk. That had gone _perfectly_, so perfectly that she should probably double-check her scenario. But the ego boost was appreciated; at least this proved she still had her manipulative ability. Above her, Snotlout climbed. He was already getting high up, but he was slowing now, apparently having difficulty finding handholds.

Almost as if someone had climbed up ahead of time and broken off the branches herself.

"Uhhhh," Snotlout called down. His voice was already distant. "Getting a little difficult–WHOA!" The "whoa" was caused by a gust of the ever-present wind, rocking the tree. At the base of the tree, that rock would have been worrying. At Snotlout's height, it was downright nauseating.

"I-I might have to come down!" Snotlout said.

"Be careful!" Azula called back up. "Those branches look pretty weak!"

"They _feel_ pretty weak–Imma keep going up..." he shimmied a little bit higher–and the branch cracked beneath him. "Oh yak-droppings!" Snotlout gripped the trunk of the tree.  
"I'm stuck."

Another gust of wind.

"I'M SLIPPING! OKAY I NEED HELP! GRAVITY PLEASE STOP IT RIGHT THIS INSTANT!"

Azula took a step back. "I-I should get help."

"OKAY I HAVE A PLAN," Snotlout called down. "I'M JUST GOING TO JUMP. CATCH ME, OKAY!"

"Uh, excuse me?" Azula said, her eyebrow raising.

"THREE!"

"No!"

"TWO!"

"Snotlout, you will actually die!"

"ONE!"

There was a long pause. Azula was ashamed to admit it, but she actually closed her eyes. She couldn't bear to see all her plans going to waste–she just couldn't watch. But surely she would have heard something by now? She looked up, hesitatingly.

And saw Snotlout still clinging to the tree-trunk. "HAHA, you actually thought I was gonna jump didn't you!" he yelled. "To be very, very clear, I would have jumped, but I didn't think you could catch me!"

"If you say so," Azula replied, breathing out a long sigh of relief. It would have ruined her plans if Snotlout had just died here. "Stay there, Snotlout. I'm going to get help."

* * *

Hiccup looked around. In front of him–clustered around the base of that dead tree he'd tried to climb once–was Dad, Spitelout, and Gobber. They were yelling up at...something up there? He caught his breath. About fifty feet up, Snotlout clung to the trunk of the tree, gripping for dear life. Hiccup looked over to his left, at Azula, taking in her flushed face–was that a twig in her hair?

"Uh, what am I doing here?" Hiccup asked, his voice shaking a little bit. Azula had just barged back into the house and yanked him all the way here, ignoring all his protests.

"That," Azula replied. "Will become apparent." She looked at the cluster of adults surrounding the tree, and her face screwed up with annoyance.

"SNOTLOUT," Spitelout called up. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING UP THERE, YA' FOOL BOYO'?"

"I'M TRYING TO STAY UP HERE, DAD!" Snotlout whined back. "WHY ELSE WOULD–WHOA–WOULD I BE UP HERE?"

Gobber decided to help by giving the tree a shake. "Get down from there!"

"Stop it Gobber," Stoick interjected. "Can't you see he obviously needs help? Someone's going to have to climb up there and get him." That said, the huge man gripped the trunk of the tree, and started to heave himself up.

The wood groaned in protest. The _entire tree_ shook. Poor Snotlout gripped for dear life. Hiccup was no expert, but he was pretty sure the whole thing would break before Dad made it to Snotlout.

"I guess if someone light could get up there?" he said to himself, phrasing it as a question. "If someone had a rope, wrapped it around one of those lower branches, and then gave the end to him, you could...lower him down? Using the branch as an anchor, I mean. I dunno, that's probably stupid..."

Azula looked at him. She looked...strangely cheerful. _Oh no._ Suddenly Hiccup put the pieces together, the twigs in her hair, the weird conversation this morning..._her jacket still attached to a branch way up on the tree–_

He pulled away, looking around nervously before leaning in towards her ear. "You did this!" he said, his voice a hushed whisper.

"Yes!" Azula beamed. "It worked perfectly! Now you just need to rescue Snotlout, and your standing will go up by miles! You can thank me whenever."

Hiccup nearly choked. "Why-why would I thank you? Oh gods–_I can't rescue him! What were you thinking?"_

And of course, she ignored him. "EVERYONE! Someone light needs to go up there with a rope. With clever positioning, we can lower him down." Stoick stopped trying to kick the tree down, and looked over at her. She continued. "I'd like to present...someone small."  
With that, she pointed at Hiccup with a flamboyant gesture, backing away as she did so to give him space.

Everyone looked at Hiccup. Hiccup looked at them.

Hiccup gulped.

Today was going to be a bad day.

* * *

_Author's note: Wow so, my internet has been awful the past week. But regardless, here's a chapter of this...whatever "this" is.  
And now, because of my 2-2 schedule, I'll move to writing "The Wind Breathes Fire".  
R and R, peeps!  
_


	6. I Don't Want To(I'll Make You)

In theory, the plan was simple enough. Hiccup, being the light, gangly, all-limbs boy that he was, could simply climb the battered tree, coiled rope in tow. He would climb past Snotlout, fasten the rope to the branch above him (the branch which still, coincidentally, had Azula's jacket attached, flapping in the wind) ,and then drop the other end to the ground. Snotlout would then use that rope to rappel down the tree. Hiccup would then climb back down, none the worse and hopefully with some newfound heroism under his belt.

_Yes,_ Hiccup thought, a flame of determination beginning to burn in his chest. He gripped the truck of the tree with both hands and looked up at his wailing cousin. _I might actually be able to pull this off._

He'd always been a good climber, and–the wind suddenly picked up, and the tree groaned worryingly. Hiccup's flame of determination gave a little sputter.

"ARE YOU KIDDING ME?" Snotlout's voice made itself known from up above. His death-grip on the treetrunk redoubled, fighting the claws of the wind."NO WAY, NO HOW AM I BEING RESCUED BY HICCUP THE USELESS! Is there literally ANYONE ELSE?"

"Thanks for the confidence," Hiccup muttered, placing his foot on the tree. He was keenly aware of the eyes of the assembled Vikings surrounding him, staring at him, expecting (for once) that he'd be able to do something USEFUL and BRAVE. Well, he hoped they were anyway. He could already imagine them muttering to themselves about who would replace him as the next Chief when both Hiccup and Snotlout were reduced to red piles of smush on the ground, as flat as the loaves of bread Stoick would sometimes try to bake.

Between that and the wind, the flame of determination was starting to resemble more of...a large candle.

And then the first few drops of rain hit his nose. _Great. Couldn't get any worse._

Summoning his nerve, Hiccup began to climb. He had to get to Snotlout before his determination turned into less of a fire and more of that white stuff you find crusted in the back of a really old fireplace.

"GUYS, IT'S RAINING!" Snotlout screamed, "IT'S RAINING IT'S RAINING, I DON'T LIKE IT!"

"Hiccup, don't hesitate!" Azula's thin voice joined the cacophony, yelling up at Hiccup to contrast Snotlout yelling _down_ at him. "You can do this. It's your _destiny."_

Hiccup wasn't sure that "destiny" normally meant "I forced you to do this and if you fail I'll look foolish", but he appreciated the comment. It was better than what _Snotlout_ was doing, wiggling around and rocking the tree back and forth so much that even Hiccup's superior climbing skills were being put to the test. He was also wailing loud enough that it put the rumbling thunder in the distance to shame.

"What are you waiting for, COME SAVE ME ALREADY!"

"I'm...coming! This isn't the easy thing you make it out to be," was Hiccup's sarcastic mumbled reply.

"OF COURSE IT ISN'T! I AM THE PEAK OF PHYSICAL PERFECTION! MY ARMS AREN'T EVEN BURNING! BUT HYPOTHETICALLY YOU SHOULD ACT LIKE THEY WERE HYPOTHETICALLY!"

"Careful, son," Stoick added from below, as Hiccup traversed an especially unstable bit of bark.

"Grip, GRIP I say!" Spitelout roared, as an especially strong gust of wet wind set the tree to rocking.

"Alright, who wants to make a bit of a wee wager on whether the lad will make it?" Gobber piped up, looking around as the tree gave an unsettling groan "Any takers? Anyone?"

_"_IT'S GETTING WETTER! IF I DIE, I WANT AT LEAST ONE STATUE ERECTED IN MY HONOR!" Snotlout continued his wail. "And HICCUP should be punished for causing the DEATH OF A HERO!"

Meanwhile, Hiccup himself was actually suprisingly close now, only a few feet below Snotlout's posterior. Despite himself, his proximity to success was setting his heart into excited convulsions. Well, it was the success, _or _it was the deadly, horrifying danger of being dozens of feet in the air, but Hiccup was what they called an optimist. Probably.  
Finally, he pulled himself around the trunk, gripping with his knees and thighs, and began shimmying past Snotlout, heading for the branch feet above his head. Snotlout watched him pass, fuming and sputtering and generally looking considerably less than heroic and more like a scared, wet child.

"About time!"

Hiccup's reply was a grunt, as he pulled himself atop the branch. He carefully turned around, and let his legs dangle over the side. He'd made it! He let out a relieved pant, looking down at all the upturned faces below him. Azula, his father, Spitelout, and of course, Snotlout. Hiccup had to admit, it felt pretty good. He even allowed himself a triumphant grin.

"STOP SMILING!" Snotlout interrupted his reverie. "GET ME DOWN!"

_Oh, right._

Hiccup brushed back a handful of wet hair and retrieved the rope from where it was coiled over his shoulder. All he had to do was tie it around the base of the branch he sat on, and then his part of the whole crazy operation would be complete. He's have saved Snotlout. He'd be a hero. He gave another look down at the Vikings below and gave a suitably heroic smile that he hoped didn't look too seasick.

And that's when everything went wrong.

Maybe it was the height. Maybe it was nerves. Maybe it was just bad luck. Or maybe it was the fact that Hiccup had suddenly noticed an extra face staring up at him from the ground, a face rimmed with ethereal blonde hair, with blue eyes that were just the right combination of fierce and beautiful, so beautiful that it made Hiccup's heart, and therefore his hands, weak.

Whatever the reason, the rope slipped from between Hiccup's fingers, and plummetted to the ground almost as fast as Hiccup's heart plummeted to his feet. It landed on the ground in front of Astrid with a final, whispering sigh. And all Hiccup, Astrid, or any of the assembled people could do was stare in stupefied horror.

_Well, **now **it can't get any worse._

And then a house exploded.

It was quite random, really. Just was Gobber beginning to see if anyone really had made any bets, just as the other Vikings let out a collective groan, just as Azula looked up at him with an expression of utter disappointment, just as Snotlout began to lay into Hiccup with what would surely be the verbal beatdown of the century...a house, visible in the distance, exploded in a burst of blue-white fire. It happened so fast that it seemed that the house had up and decided that its tenure as a house was over, and it was transitioning instantaneously into its new life as a rapidly expanding ring of fire and debris.

A high pitched screech filled the air.

"NIGHT FURY!" A Viking finally yelled, coming to his senses.

"GET DOWN!" Stoick cried, taking his own advice. He shoved Azula to the ground as he did so, and the girl, not expecting to suddenly be bodily assaulted, nearly went sprawling on her face.

"What-" Hiccup could hear her begin, but it was promptly drowned out by the sudden yelling of two dozen panicked barbarians, yelling "DRAGON ATTACK" and "GET TO THE CATAPAULTS" and "YOU'RE DEAD, HICCUP!" (Though that one was just Snotlout.)

Failing to die on the spot, Hiccup instead scanned the sky, taking full advantage of his elevated position. He could see, a depressingly short distance away, several dark shaped hurtling down from the low-hanging clouds, swooping over the village. A part of his brain, the analytical, curious part, wondered if the attack coincided with an approaching storm merely by chance, or whether it was some sign of a sinister intellect on the part of the dragons. Another, larger part of his brain suddenly realized that stuck up on this tree, he may as well have been presenting himself as a tasty treat for some Nadder or Zippleback to swoop up at its leisure.

As a ball of orange fire blossomed in the distance, Hiccup slowly realized that the gods really, really hated him.

* * *

Azula pulled herself up from the ground, just in time to witness her plans fall apart. The sky was full of wheeling, winged shapes, descending over the village and the fields beyond.

"What's going on?" she screeched out-then instantly regretted it.

_What do I think is going on, a tea party? It's an Agni-cursed dragon attack!_

"DRAGON ATTACK!" yelled Gobber helpfully.

"DRAGON ATTACK!" yelled Spitelout even more helpfully.

Azula cringed internally. This whole situation hadn't gone how she'd wanted it at all. First Hiccup had flubbed everything spectacularly, now this?

Instead of the ultimately small but relatively believable glory of rescuing Snotlout from grevious peril, her plan had instead trapped two people in a tree, distracted dozens of Berk's warriors, and all but offered the Chief's son as a meal for large flying carnivores. At least, she thought, if she had been planning an _assassination_ then this had turned out _perfectly._ In fact, a part of her mind piped up, it would probably be better for her if Hiccup actually did get eaten. That way he wouldn't be able to reveal her part in all this.

It would be difficult for her to work her way up without Hiccup to act as her proxy communicator and convenient workhorse, but would it _really_ be harder than getting _him_ to be popular enough to actually be an asset?

"Son!" Stoick was yelling up at the tree. "We're out of time. You and Snotlout will have to jump! We'll catch you!"

"Yeah, I'd love to... jump to my certain death. But I dunno, I think I might not." Hiccup replied, and the nervous crack was obvious in his voice as he looked down at them, then hurriedly back at the swooping shapes in the sky. An orange-brown mass of hide and scale careened downwards, belching up oily flames across the trees beyond.

Gobber stepped forward, placing a hand on Stoick's shoulder, though his eyes were focused on the increasingly large number of fires beginning to spread over the island. "I hate to be the voice of doom, Stoick, but we can't hang around here too long. The men need you to lead the defense, Chief."

"Not now, Gobber," Stoick replied, voice as firm as a mountain. "Not while my son is a sitting terror in a tree. Hiccup–"-his voice grew loud and commanding-"–Snotlout! I _order_ you to jump!"

Snotlout whined, and Hiccup balked. Another fire burst into life in the background.

And then, because letting Hiccup die would be quitting, and quitting was for losers like Uncle Iroh or _mother,_ Azula found herself dashing, scooping that cursed rope off the ground where it had fallen. She pushed past Astrid (who had been leaning down towards the rope, possibly about to do the very same thing that Azula was) and quickly began to scale the tree. Her small feet found holds as easily as last time, and before Stoick or the other adults could stop her, she was already out of reach.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" Stoick, Snotlout, and Hiccup all yelled at her together, which Azula didn't think was either an intelligent question or a particularly _grateful_ one.

"What does it look like?" she fired back, pulling herself up to Snotlout's level. Unlike Hiccup, she simply used him as an extra handhold, digging her sharp nails into him to steady herself. The tree rocked, but what else was new? Really, she was beginning to think this tree just liked to groan. It and Snotlout were a perfect fit, really.

Steadying herself as best she could, and drowning out Snotlout's complaints, she threw one end up to Hiccup. It smacked him in the face, but luckily he managed to catch it, at least he wasn't slow witted on top of being incredibly useless.

"Tie that to the branch again," she ordered, "and don't even think about dropping it this time!"

"Nice of you to think about our safety now, after you got me up here in the first place!" was the reply, though Hiccup set to work, hurriedly working on tying a firm knot. Unfortunately, he hadn't gotten to the "Knotwork 101" potion of his curriculum yet, and his fingers were just a little bit numb, and his hands were shaking, so it took longer than it should have.

"Hurry up!" Azula yelled. (In a princess-like manner)

"I'm hurrying!" Hiccup yelled.

"Hurry _more_!" Azula yelled (in a less princess-like manner)

"My back!" Azula's footing yelled.

"GET DOWN! NOW!" Stoick yelled, in a voice that seemed for some reason even louder than his normal one. Even the chief was letting the moment get to him.

"I'm done!" Hiccup exclaimed, pulling his hands away from the rope like it was going to burn him. Azula let the other end drop, and it dangled to the ground. She then clung to it, pulling herself off Snotlout, hanging just above him with her feet against the trunk of the tree.

"GET DOWN **NOW!"** Stoick yelled again, and this time his voice definitely sounded almost frantic. Azula frowned. He could at least have offered a "well done" or something, she'd just accomplished what Hiccup obviously couldn't, and even though that wasn't her original plan it was actually a pretty nice consolation prize-

_Whoom._

That noise was all the warning she got before several things happened. Her mind, always analytical, sorted them into several things of various importance, ranging from the "minor inconvenience" to "this is life endingly bad."

1: Azula's jacket finally blew free from the branch, settling in the thick wet bushes.  
2: Snotlout decided jumping from the tree wasn't such a bad idea after all, wasting all the work they'd done this whole time.  
3: Snotlout screamed. Like, really screamed. The type of scream Azula had only heard when Ty Lee had been stung by an angry bumblehornet, and her whole arm had swollen up.  
4: Stoick threw his axe at her. Well, not _at_ her, but close enough that she instinctively ducked her head.  
5: A massive, _massive _scaly talon emerged from the sky like a bad dream, attached to a blueish-white winged body with far, far too many spikes, like some kind of demon bird.  
6: Hiccup screamed, and his scream was actually somehow manlier than Snotlout's. Wait. Or was that her own voice?

And then the next few bullet points were all repetitions of "A dragon snapped off the entire branch Hiccup was sitting on, and because Azula was hanging from a rope tied to that same branch, she and Hiccup were plucked from the tree and carted off into the sky, never to be seen again as they were undoubtedly eaten in unspeakably gruesome ways."

Definitely should have left him to die.

* * *

_Author's Note: Whoa guys, what a crazy year, huh? _

_Anyway, here's a new chapter. The good thing about this story is that you can take massive breaks, come back to it, and pick up right where you left off. Though that may not always be the case, I always write continuity, and Azula's presence is definitely gonna make things go very, very AU by the time it gets to the point the movies start at._

_Is it bad if, while thinking this story through, I ended up kinda shipping Hiccup and Azula? Is that even a ship? What the hell kind of abomination am I creating?_

_OH WELL!_


	7. Vikings Can't Fly(Nor Can Princesses)

_**Author's Note: I uploaded this chapter before but I deleted it because I was fixing typos. Here it is again.**_

* * *

The thing about flying that no-one ever thinks about is how _loud_ it is. Sure, there are less things around to make noise, but the constant rushing of wind over your ears makes it nearly impossible to hear anything else. For instance, as a purely hypothetical example, if there was a pre-teen Viking only a few feet away from you screaming his lungs out as he's being carted through the sky, you'd be nearly unable to hear him at all.

Nearly.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!" screamed Hiccup, a pre-teen Viking currently occupied with screaming his lungs out as he was carted through the sky.

"Shut UP!"

Azula swung around like a pendulum, hanging on for dear life. She was trying to stay poised and princess-like, but she was, in her defense, very high up, clinging from a rope hanging from a branch in the talons of some flying nightmare creature of myth and legend. She'd actually like to scream some herself if she was being honest, but her breath was having a hard time finding it's way out of her lungs at the moment.

A glance downward-bad idea! The ground was so very, very far away. Stoick, Astrid, and the assembled Vikings were being left behind, their best efforts to run after them meaningless in the face of a dragon's flight. Azula quickly turned her gaze up, not that the view was much better in that direction either. There was just a screaming Viking doing his best to cling to both the branch and the dragon's talons, and of course, the dragon itself. She'd much rather not look at the dragon.

_Whoom._

The dragon beat its wings, causing it to lurch in the air. The rope jerked, sliding an inch upwards through Azula's hands before white-hot adrenaline caused her to clench even tighter. Frantic panic gradually gave way to rational thought, and she started to pull herself back up, hand over hand-but the rope was slick with rain, and her progress was minuscule.

"Listen, peasant boy," she said, and she hated how small her voice sounded, almost trembling. A princess should _command_, not beg. "I'm slipping."

Hey, remember that thing about flying and how loud it is?

_Whoom._

Another beat. Another inch. Azula tried to grasp onto the rope with her feet, but she was dangling over open air with nothing to leverage herself against. And it wasn't exactly like she'd practiced with a lot of ropes in her short (brilliant, incredible, prodigious) life. She'd practiced some acrobatics with Ty Lee, but nothing like this. A thought, a very real, very unwelcome thought, came to her that she might die like this, a victim of her own _brilliant_ plan. Father would never have tolerated this, and that thought was almost more terrifying.

"HICCUP!" she called again, voice shrill and high.

This time the boy actually heard her, ceasing his terrified screaming long enough to look down at her. He yelled "Wahahoooo ahoo" which was probably actually "What do I do?" but it was very windy.

"I need you to pull me up." _Whoom._ "QUICKLY!"

"Uhhhhhhh," Hiccup stammered, gripping the rope with one hand-he didn't have the balance to pull with both hands without falling off. But what he actually accomplished from that position was just a feeble wiggling of the rope, far from enough strength to actually pull Azula to the incredibly tenuous safety of the dragon's talon. In fact, his wiggling was actually dislodging Azula's grip. A horrible sinking feeling leadened Azula's gut.

_He can't pull me up. He's not strong enough. _

"I can't pull you up! I'm not strong enough!" Hiccup confirmed helpfully, face drawn tight with worry. "H-hold on!"

"PULL HARDER!" she yelled, now fully unable to keep the crawling fear out of her voice. She risked a quick glance down, finding that they were flying over forested ground, the village had disappeared behind a hill. Rain spattered across her face and steamed on contact, evidence of her tense emotional state. Her hands _hurt, _the rope between her fingers digging a channel through her delicate hands.

"Hold...on!"

Hiccup's voice yanked her attention up. He was now gripping the rope with both hands, pulling up and by some _miracle _not falling off. He pulled-and this time, the rope lifted. An entire foot, and no further. Even in this position, he still didn't have enough leverage. Azula grit her teeth. Why did she have to be stuck up here with the one Viking on berk who couldn't pull her up? This was entirely unfair. Wasn't she supposed to be _lucky_? Father had said she was lucky, but-

"SHHHKRAAAAAAAAAAAA!" The dragon suddenly interjected, tired of playing carrier pigeon to the swingiest prey it had ever grabbed.

With a heart-dropping lurch, it banked steeply in the air. The motion forced Azula to hang on for dear life, and whipped poor Hiccup straight from his perch, sending him sliding down the rope at an alarming speed. Azula had never felt so helpless, watching him slide down until he crashed into her.

And then the branch, the cursed branch that was both their tormentor and their life-line, decided enough was enough. Caught between the centrifugal motions of two youths and the unrelenting claws of a dragon, it gave out faster than Uncle Iroh's resolve at the siege of Ba Sing Se. It snapped with a horrendous crunch, sending a spray of wood into the air–and leaving Azula and Hiccup to plummet to their collective dooms.

* * *

Or rather, they plummetted into a nearby tree, where the rope tangled in branches as they fell through, slowing their fall enough so that when Hiccup finally hit the ground, instead of feeling the sweet release of death, he only felt agonizing pain akin to being crushed beneath a falling yak. Hiccup would know, he had been crushed between a falling yak before. (Thanks, Ruffnut.)

Delightful.

He lay on his face a few minutes, head spinning. After the rushing wind, the forest floor was incredibly quiet, almost peaceful, and Hiccup found he wouldn't mind just lying here forever. He'd think about the fact that there was still a Deadly Nadder around later. The fact he was basically alone in a forest? Later. The fact that he and Azula would have to walk all the way back? Later.

Well actually, he realized, he'd kind of lost sight of Azula after the branch had snapped. Maybe she was dead. That would be a shame–

Something pointed and indignant kicked him in the back. Not dead then.

With a groan, he rolled over. Azula was standing over him, hair full of displaced leaves and face arrayed with scratches. She started back at his movement, as if she'd expected _him_ to be dead. For a moment he just stared at her, watching her regain her composure while his ears stopped ringing. It was a solid minute later that he felt the time was right to say what needed to be said.

"At least my knot held."

Azula just stared at him with those angry gold eyes of hers, making no movement to help him up as he struggled to his feet. Actually, he felt rather good; aside from some bruises and a lot of mud, no-one could have told that he'd just fallen from a dragon. Oh, this would actually be a pretty sweet story to tell the others once he got back. Sure, he hadn't slain a dragon, but surviving one was almost as good, right? Nevermind that it had all been purely by chance.

"Alright, you're up," Azula's voice interrupted his daydreaming. Thor, he could _barely_ hear her, his ears were still ringing painfully.

Hiccup rolled his shoulders, flashing her a lopsided grin. "Yeah, it takes more than that to get rid of all this Viking. Can't get rid of me that easily." The effect was somewhat ruined by a large drop of water falling on his nose. Oh right, yes, it was still raining. Thank you so much, Thor.

"Ahem," Azula interjected yet again, drawing her hand up to the side of her face. An orange flame blossomed above her palm, where it hovered like a torch but without the wood and cloth and oil. Probably a good idea, it was actually getting dark. But his...friend? Housemate? Whatever she was, it seemed she wasn't finished quite yet.

"I'm sure that we could hash out who was responsible for this little predicament we're in," she said, softly.

_Huh._

"And I'm sure you've realized that revealing my part in this could be disastrous for me," she continued.

_Huh?_

"Before you get too ahead of yourself though, consider this. Just now, I could have just killed you to keep you quiet. It would have been very easy to blame on the dragon, no-one would have questioned it."

_WHAT?_

"But, in an act of mercy, I decided against that course of action. You might think that you can leverage the fact that you're the only one who knows the way out–you're probably thinking you could just leave me here. Well, rest assured, I _can_ get that information out of you if I need to, though I'd much rather it not come to that. Therefore, I think it's reasonable to consider a settlement be made before we return to the village. I won't hurt you, and you won't reveal that I was behind that whole disaster with the tree. "

"Uhhhhhh," Hiccup stared, blinking rapidly. He'd vastly underestimated the severity of the situation.

He raised a hand, acutely aware of Azula's wary eyes following the motion.

Then he cupped his ear, apologetically.

"I'm sorry, could you–could you repeat that?"

Azula's fire sputtered flat.

"Yeah," Hiccup continued, flashing her another grin. He hoped she hadn't said anything important. "My ears are really ringing. Anyway, uh, we should probably find our way out of this forest before that Nadder comes back. Fortunately, I've been all over these woods. You can just follow me."

"WAIT!"

That finally broke through the ringing, as it was yelled with the force of an angry Thunderdrum. Hiccup sent a glance over his shoulder, just in time to see Azula spring into motion. She leaped up with a burst of flame, kicked off a tree and skidded down to a stop in front of Hiccup, flames flickering about her feet. Hiccup drew back, eyes wide, as she advanced on him.

"I KNOW you're blaming me for all this!"

_Nope. Nopenopenopenope_.

Hiccup, with his senses finely tuned for detecting when someone was about to beat him up, did what he'd found to be the best solution all around. Namely, he drew on his experience, turned on his heel, and ran.

"ADMIT IT!" the shriek was accompanied by heat. Where had this all come from? What had he missed?

"I mean yes, I do actually blame you for this! I wonder _why on earth that could be?_"

"And you're going to tell _everyone_ when we get back!"

"I AM SERIOUSLY CONSIDERING IT NOW THAT YOU'VE MENTIONED IT!" Hiccup fired back, demonstrating his incredible ability to dig his own grave.

A wash of flame whirred past him, leaving a trail across the forest floor that quickly petered to smoke, thank Thor. The rain was actually useful for once. However, the wall of smoke and fire did cut off his escape route, forcing him to turn 90 degrees and pic an alternate path, ducking beneath branches and around bushes.

"STOP RUNNING!"

"I'D RATHER NOT!"

Another fireball sailed bast his ear, except this one curved mid-air and crashed into the ground in front of him, sealing off another escape route. Huh. He hadn't known she could do that. Again, that analytical part of his brain piped in with questions. How did she control the fire _after_ she threw it? How did she throw fire at all? Actually, since when could she throw fireballs from her feet, wasn't that a bit much–

That part of his brain was silenced as a heavy weight slammed into his back with a jarring thud, sending him sprawling on his face for the second time today. Already bruised ribs gave painful protests, but at least his fall had been stopped by a convenient amount of mud. Oh goodie.  
He tried to struggle to his feet, but Azula was on him, straddling his back and slamming a hand against the back of his neck. Her hand was _hot_. Very very hot.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" he wailed, wiggling around as best he could.

"I'm–"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH"

"Listen–" Azula growled, and her hands cooled down somewhat. However, her body weight didn't lessen in the slightest, enough to keep him down no matter how much he struggled. "It was my plan that got us here, and even though there were circumstances beyond my control, and if you hadn't been so utterly inept everything would have gone perfectly, it was still _technically_ my fault. So here's what's going to happen. I am going to _apologize_, and you are going to _forgive me_, and then we will never speak of this again." Heat made itself freshly apparent on the back of Hiccup's neck. "_Understand?_"

"No!" Hiccup wiggled, Viking stubbornness making its way to the fore. "Look, I don't want to tell you how to be insane, but you are clearly really, really bad at apologizing–"

"Forgive. Me." said Azula.

"NO!" said Hiccup.

"YES!" said Azula.

"NO!" said Hiccup.

"SHRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAA!" said the Deadly Nadder.

Both youths stiffened, and their argument was suddenly snuffed out into deathly silence. The Nadder, the selfsame one that had dropped them here in the first place, thudded down into the forest floor a _depressingly_ short distance away. Its nostrils flared, taking in the scents around it, wreathed in the smoke of Azula's fire like a demon from Helheim. Hiccup didn't dare move, and judging by the sudden stillness and lack of heat on his back, Azula was doing the same.

_Maybe it won't smell us through all this smoke?_

And Hiccup was actually right. The shroud of smoke interfered with the Nadder's sense of smell so much that it didn't have the slightest chance of smelling anything at all, let alone two muddy children clinging to the ground.

It could _see_ them just fine though.

Yellow eyes narrowed, and a shrill, rattling shriek filled the forest.

* * *

Stoick overlooked the village. All in all, the attack hadn't been too bad. There were the usual burning houses that would need to be rebuilt AGAIN, stolen sheep and scattered flocks. But no, all things considered, there was nothing new in this attack.  
Well, except for one thing. This time, the dragons had made off with _his son_.

Stoick the Vast wasn't an emotional man. Most people would say he had two settings; "chief," and "wrath of Thor incarnate." But everyone, _everyone_ knew, you did not mess with Stoick's family and live for very much longer.

Which was why, even though it had been a running gag EVERY SINGLE dragon attack that "this will be the time Hiccup buys it," no-one was saying anything.

"He could still be out there, chief," Gobber said, standing at his side. The other man was fiddling with the tip of his hooked hand, clearly wishing he was anywhere else. "You know, stranger things have happened."

Stoick clenched a massive fist at his side. "I wish I could believe that, Gobber."

* * *

_Author's Note: So, Azula is kind of...hard to make friends with._ _I don't think it's possible to write a story like this without the fact that she's MESSED UP popping up at least once. In her defence, she's pretty stressed. However unfortunately for her, she has never dealt with Vikings before.__ Also poor Stoick, first Valka, now Hiccup...  
WILL HICCUP SURVIVE? WILL AZULA BE GROUNDED FOR LIFE WHEN SHE RETURNS? WILL HICCUP AND HER EVER BECOME FRIENDS? WHEN STOICK FINDS OUT THAT HICCUP IS ALIVE, WILL IT BE WARM AND FUZZY?  
_

_Find out soooooooon™  
_


	8. Pursuit Predators(The Best Defense)

Limbs.

Smells.

Fear.

Many-Sky-Scales could smell the humans over the smoke, hear the crunch-crunch-shlop of their stupid little feet pounding against the wet leaves and mud. They were quick and darty, like sunlight on fish scales, but Many-Sky-Scales was quicker and faster, and it was only a matter of time. _She _would be pleased. The Queen loved humans, even though their meat was stringy and foul and Many-Sky-Scales would rather be swooping through the open air, twisting after seabirds in flight–

_The Queen comes first._

Of course. As always.

The memory of seabirds vanished beneath that familiar comforting hum, and the smell of human filled the nostrils.

* * *

Hiccup ducked under a branch, barely keeping it from whipping him across the face. A rattling roar echoed out behind him, evidence that his pursuer was gaining ground. A blast of hot air washed across his back, the great whuff-whuff of massive lungs bearing down on him. Jaws opened.

_Whoooosh!_

A stream of orange fire crashed into the Nadder's nose, knocking it off-course and making it stumble. Hiccup was given a few moments to gain ground, and he sent a glance over his shoulder to see the Nadder shatter a tree against its head, shaking itself up and down to clear its eyes. Azula twisted smoothly in front of it, picking up her own pace and staying on Hiccup's tail.

So far, their escape from the Nadder had gone as so.

1: RUNRUNRUN  
2: NADDERS ARE FASTER THAN VIKINGS  
3: FIREBALL IT ALREADY  
4: NADDERS CAN STUMBLE IF YOU HIT THEM ON THE NOSE  
5: RUNRUNRUN  
6: REPEAT

"Why won't this thing leave us alone?" Azula hissed, weaving around a bush as she caught up with him. She was fast when she wanted to be, as he knew from their earlier scuffle, and she had an uncanny ability to traverse obstacles without seeming to ever slow down. Unlike him, who seemed to be being caught by every snag or thorn in his path.

"Dragons–" Hiccup swallowed, his lungs burning. "Dragons always go for the kill! It's what they do!"

Azula sent a worryingly venomous glare behind her. "I'll show it going for the kill-"

But to Hiccup's relief, she maintained her course, apparently not liking her odds against a reptilian horror of unknown powers by herself. So far her fireballs were the only things keeping them alive, but they were more knocking the Nadder's face around than doing any real damage. So for now they'd just keep running, ducking around branches and around bushes and past that narrow valley–

_Wait!_

Hiccup would fully admit that there were a lot of things he didn't know much about. How to fight. How to get along with girls. But there was one thing he _was_ pretty knowledgeable about, something drilled into him by always being the smallest kid around; he did know how to spot a hiding place. So when he passed that dark shape to his right, he turned and dived in without really thinking about it, gripping Azula's wrist and yanking her along too.

She gave only a slight resistance before realizing what he was doing, and in seconds the two of them had squeezed up against the insides of the ravine. The thundering footsteps of the dragon approached, and Hiccup tensed, barely daring to breathe. Maybe it would go past and leave them alone?

But of course, the dragon spotted them immediately and jammed its face in the cleft after them. FORTUNATELY, its head was far too big; instead of a mouthful of delicious children, it instead got a mouthful of un-delicious rocks. It tried again and again, jumping around and trying to get at them from another angle, but it was no use.

YES!

Then it gave a huffing roar directly in their faces and then sat down, staring at the cleft. _W__aiting._

Yeeeeesss.

"Shouldn't it be able to burn us to death?" Azula whispered, eyes fixed on the Nadder.

Hiccup nodded, panting heavily. "Yeah, but it probably doesn't want to overcook us. Everyone knows a Nadder's breath can turn a man to ash in seconds."

"It's a magnificent creature," Azula continued, not taking her eyes off it. "Let's kill it."

"W-what?"

"You heard me. Imagine, no-one would ever remember that you failed to rescue Snotface–"

"Snotlout."

"–That's what I said, Snotlout, from a dumb tree. That failure would be forgotten, swept aside in the face of glorious accomplishment. Your name would go down in history! Isn't that what you want?" she turned back on him, and that crazy intense light was in her eyes again. The last time he'd seen that was when, oh yeah, it was right before she decided to ATTACK HIM OUT OF THE BLUE. Good times.

"Well I hate to burst your bubble," Hiccup mumbled, drawing his shoulders up closer to his head. "But I'm pretty sure most of the people in Berk have killed a Nadder. They're not exactly a Night Fury if you know what I mean."

"Oh." Azula deflated, looking disappointed. She frowned, then crossed her arms. "How many dragons are there? That thing should at least count for something." Hiccup followed her eyes to the Nadder's nose, still soot-stained from her repeated blasts. "It definitely would have eaten Zuko."

"What?"

"My brother," she explained. "He's older than me, but a real dum-dum. That dragon would definitely have eaten him. It probably would have eaten you too, so you can thank me for saving your life."

"Thannnnkkksss..." Hiccup said uncertainly, swallowing. Something about that whole sentence, the way she said it, just seemed off. "You're pretty good at that fire thing."

It was dark, and the situation was quite cramped to say the least. It was also wet and muddy and gross. Yet Hiccup could _feel_ the pride in Azula's voice, feel the way the practically _crowed_. "Yes I am, thank you for noticing. I am going to be the youngest firebending master in Fire Nation-" she trailed off, the pleased edge vanishing from her voice. "But you wouldn't even know what that is, would you?."

The dragon shifted, turning its head so that it could watch them with its other eye.

"Anyway..." Azula huffed, turning back to face him. "You forgive me now, right?"

Hiccup groaned, and the Nadder perked up. He dropped his voice to a whisper. "Oh gods..."

"I saved your life!" Azula said, indignantly. "Multiple times!"

"Yeah, and that's great! But that has nothing to do with getting me and Snotlout stuck in that tree!" Hiccup said, trying to throw his arms up but finding that the situation prevented it. "AND you attacked me! What, am I supposed to just forget all that?"

"Puh-lease. That was hardly an attack. You ran, I chased. Besides, the thing with the tree was for your own benefit. I was trying to help you. I didn't exactly see you selling me out at the time, you seemed perfectly fine with going along with my plan until things went _wrong_."

"That's..." Hiccup cut himself off. She did have a point. It would be a bit hypocritical of him to say that it was all Azula's fault. He couldn't really deny that a part of him had hoped that he'd have been able to save Snotlout in front of everyone. Maybe then they'd have stopped saying he was so useless.  
"Alright, I guess I can give you that..."

"See? Hah," Azula crossed her arms, her expression shifting to a triumphant smirk. "You're not really any better than I am. Anyway, now that that's out of the way...I suppose we need to find a way past that dragon–you called it a "Nadder?"

"Yeah..." Hiccup huffed dejectedly. He could still feel the warm spot on the back of his neck where she'd nearly burned him, and she seemed to want him to just forget that had ever happened. Glumly, he considered the fact that it wasn't the first time he'd been chased down and attacked, and all things considered, Azula's attack hadn't even been as bad as what Snotlout would do on occasion...but Snotlout had never immediately tried to be his "friend" again right afterward. There were things he wanted to say, but Azula made words dance around and do backflips. It all left him feeling very confused.

"It's a Deadly Nadder," he continued, voice low. "I mean, if we could kill it,"–his insides squirmed for some reason at the thought– "it'd be better than nothing, but, I don't know if you noticed that your fireballs aren't really affecting it and I don't have a weapon besides my raw Viking strength–"

"That strength that couldn't pull me up a rope," Azula interjected accusingly, and Hiccup almost imagined a slight shudder run go up her arms in the waning light. Well, she might be cold. She still didn't have her jacket.

"Yeah exactly," Hiccup continued, unaffected. "So I don't know, I was thinking we _avoided_ the giant flying death-beast. For now."

"Fine, you're the expert, right?" said Azula, the exasperated frown obvious in her voice. "But I'm still getting muddy, and it's freezing out here. Let's go."

The idea of focus let his always curious mind escape the gloomy situation. His eyes grazed back over the darkness, peering further along the cleft behind them. Maybe they could squeeze through and see where it came out? It seemed worth a shot. It was also, coincidentally, the only option since their other exit was blocked by two tons of scale and muscle.

"Alright, this is probably a terrible idea," he sighed, signaling Azula. Once he had her attention, he began to wiggle his way back along the cleft, step by step.

The two made their way along, though the going was so narrow that at times they had to turn sideways and push with their chests against the wall in front of them and their backs against the hill behind them. The rattling roars of the Nadder echoed behind them, gradually becoming fainter. One thing Hiccup hadn't thought about was how much rainwater would get funneled into a ravine like this. Very soon, they were both extremely wet and shivering, though water that hit Azula's skin seemed to steam away quickly. She was like a living fireplace behind him, which was actually pleasant to have around.

At one point there was a horrible rattling above them, and he looked up to see the Nadder scuttling around atop the ravine. But it passed them quickly, apparently not realizing they were there.

* * *

Finally, after what felt like hours, they emerged from the ravine into a little clearing. The clouds had disappeared, and the moon shone down on them, bright and full. Azula gazed up at it, blinking as her eyes adjusted from the continued darkness of the ravine. This was the first time she'd really seen it in its full glory since she got here, it had always been cloudy before.

It was a _different moon_. The craters, the contours, they were all just _wrong_ in some way. It was a completely different sphere than the familiar one she had grown up with. Azula had never been sentimental, but the thought made her close her eyes. It was final, definite proof that she was impossibly far from home. The icy wind blew against her face, stinging. It was almost enough to elicit tears. The wind, that is. Definitely the wind.

"Oh, yes! Yes! Do you see that!?"

Her eyes snapped open, and she turned to look at her gangly minion. He'd been quiet the entire journey, which was uncharacteristic of him. But now he was grasping the sides of his head and looking at a broken stump like it was the most beautiful thing in the world.

"An old friend I presume?" she asked, trotting up alongside him.

The excitement was palpable. It was almost hard to remain detached and focused, but she had to come up with a strategy. She still wasn't sure what Hiccup was going to say when they had to explain the story to his father. What would she do if he sold her out? She hated to admit it, but she needed _someone_ on her side here. But even though her plan had been technically for his benefit, it had ended with him nearly being eaten by a dragon and dumped in a forest. She'd thought that she could cow him into silence with the reliable threat of mortal terror, but he was surprisingly _stubborn_. What she should have done was simply act contrite, she realized. But it was too late for that now, such a ploy would be far too transparent.

But what were her options? She had no sway here, no reputation, and the whole situation was sending her into nervous shivers that had nothing to do with the cold.

"Well, you could say that," Hiccup said in response to her earlier statement, rolling his shoulders. "Come on, we're almost there."

He darted off, all flailing limbs and lanky movements, and she had no choice but to stalk after him.

* * *

It was actually only a short walk until Berk was in view. The village lights, flickering in the near distance, were the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen. That was obviously the effect of exhaustion speaking, and a violently patriotic thought insisted that normally her own city was a million times more beautiful than this fishing village with some of its houses still on fire. But that thought was almost crushed by her freezing shoulders, aching feet, and the myriad of cuts across her face that were quite insistent now in telling her that they _hurt_.

Hiccup jogged down the hill, the eagerness almost making him seem to forget his own exhaustion, and she followed, slipping and sliding in the wet soggy grass. However, her mind was only half on the terrain. It was gross, yes, and there shouldn't exist a world where a princess like herself would have to walk on it, but the real conundrum was that if they were _this_ close to the village, then the crucial time was fast approaching. She didn't know Stoick, the boy's father, all that well. But he was still _a father, _and a chief besides. She was certain that this embarrassing failure of an expedition would be met with harsh consequences if he was at all like her own father(the very pinnacle of how a proper father should behave, in her unbiased opinion.)

What would her father do if he were here?

Burn the whole village to the ground, probably. Then get the surviving peasants to construct him a glorious ship upon which he'd sail home, perhaps keeping some of the stronger men as slaves or trophies to be brought back to the Fire Nation. He'd definitely kill a few of these dragons, earning TWICE the recognition that _Uncle _had when he killed the supposed 'last dragons.' Perhaps, she allowed herself to think a truly audacious thought, he'd bring back one for her, so that she would have the chance to kill one in front of the assembled crowds. She'd succeed, of course, and lay its head at Father's feet. And then he'd smile, and everyone would know that she was the _perfect_ child.

Unfortunately, Father was _not_ here, and she couldn't pull off something like that. What would Mother do?

Ugh. _She'd_ just run away without saying goodbye.

The thought soured her mood even further, and before Azula really had time to mentally prepare, they were here. She could see houses looming up on either side of them, Vikings staring at them open-mouth as they trod past. No-one had approached them yet, but Azula could feel the questions in their eyes. Some of the buildings still smoked, others were straight-up blasted open by bolts of dragonfire. At the very fringe of the village lay the skeleton of a massive catapult, blown to bits. Several of the metal components were melted away, and Azula found herself impressed; what kind of fire melted _steel_?

"Hiccup!" a voice called, and she looked around to see a chubby boy staring at them like they were ghosts. Muddy, soaked ghosts. Wait, she knew this boy. Fishlegs, was it? They had such stupid names here, but she remembered Fishlegs because Hiccup had told her he'd have rather paired with Fishlegs than her. Hmph. What was so great about him?

"Hey..." Hiccup said, trying to look casual despite his exhaustion. "Yeah, I just thought I'd drop by."

_So far so good..._Azula thought, looking around at where other Vikings were gathering. _But the real test is when the Chief makes his appearance._

"How are you...oh gods, how are you still alive? We saw you get taken by the Nadder!"

"Well," Hiccup grinned, and Azula suddenly _knew_ that he had been practicing in his head for this exact question. "You could say we–"

"Nadders have incredible speed," Fishlegs interrupted. "We thought you'd be halfway to the Nest by now!"

"Yeah, well you could say we–"

"Once their talons grip onto something, they will keep holding it even after they die!"

"Yes, well, you could say we–"

"They can track a scent over several miles, and once they have prey in their sights, there's no way to escape!" Fishlegs interrupted AGAIN, and at this point even Azula had to suppress a chuckle at Hiccup's expense.

"FISHLEGS!" Hiccup burst out, finally. "FOR THE LOVE OF THOR!"

Fishlegs finally stopped talking, looking them up and down again. "I'm sorry Hiccup, I'm talking and you must be exhausted, and your dad–OH! Chief Stoick was so worried! He'll be so happy! Follow me!"  
And then he bustled off, clearly expecting them to follow without waiting for a response.

Hiccup stepped forwards, but he only made it a few feet before there was a sudden commotion among the Vikings who were gathered around, and then–

"HICCUP!" a loud booming voice rang out, and Chief Stoick suddenly pushed his way past two other Vikings to stand at the fore.

Any humor that Azula had been harboring before disappeared, vanishing beneath a wave of ice that numbed her veins. She was again struck by how large that man really was. She wasn't scared, obviously, but the fact had to be taken into consideration that Stoick the Vast was in fact a mountainous man.

This was it. This was the moment. Her eyes flew to Hiccup. How would he try to spin this? He'd want to get himself out of trouble first, right? Maybe he'd start with the escape from the Nadder to distract from the situation that got him there first. That wouldn't be so bad. But what if he brought up that she'd attacked him? Would he admit that he had been weak enough to be taken down with no resistance?

"Hey, Da–"

But that was all Hiccup got out before he was suddenly swallowed in a hug that looked like it should have crushed him, sweeping the boy straight off his feet. _What was this?_ There weren't even any questions. No explanations or anything at all. Stoick just up and hugged his son, just like that.

As Azula watched this display of utter deviancy in silence, she decided this was the strangest thing she'd seen since she'd arrived.

* * *

_Author's Note: Hmmmmm. I'm thinking I may write longer chapters, so I can get these "episodes" into a more concise format without having them drag on. In any case, here we are. I always thought it was clear that Stoick loved his son a lot, which was why Hiccup was so driven to be a son worth loving. It's an interesting parallel to Azula, who also wants nothing more than her father to be proud of her (she named a CITY "New Ozai" for crying out loud) but never received any real love. Hiccup over there is more like Zuko, but his father loves him, what's with that?_

_Also feel bad for that Nadder, it probably got eaten by the Red Death for not bringing back any food._


End file.
